The taper.

The anticipation is growing. Cubs Playoffs start tomorrow, Biden disects Palin on Thursday and in 12 days, I run the Marathon. Holy crap. I am so excited it's getting hard to keep it in.

Before I comment about how my 20 mile run helped me prepare, I owe a few long overdue shout outs..

1) Michelle "Mish" Seitz. The most bad ass massage therapist ever. Mish kindly donated a pre and post massages to me. She is the tiniest person but is insanely strong and knows how to inflict pain...in a good way!

2) Nicole Console. Neighbor and hostess with the mostess. Reads my blog religiously and posted a supremely inspiring comment after my 20 miler bummer post.

3) DeMarkus Purham. Watch for this kid. He's going to be something. DeMarkus did the incredible, one of a kind, art piece in our ballroom and generously agreed to try to capture a vision I had one morning running in a sketch for t-shirts for the fam on Marathon day. (equal shout to Jerry and Jeff at PSN for doing the shirts for us!) If you're Chicagoans, check out (and buy) DeMarkus' work at the Streeterville Artisans Market on November 7 & 8 at Northwestern's Lurie Center downtown.

4) Hillary "Hill" Cavan. The person who inspired me 2 years ago to take this journey and my biggest fan along the way. Couldn't have done it with her. Starting last week, Hill has been posting new marathon maps with the countdown on my door. Each points out different points along the path and an inspirational saying or race tip!

Thanks to each of you. You rock!

So, Sunday, I ran a half marathon. Not an organized one. Just me and the trail. It was perfect and just what I needed. Got my head in the right place and I enjoyed visions of crossing the finish line with friends and family cheering me on! The run took me over 100 miles for September. My biggest month ever.

So, what happened on 9/21. The Nike Ready to Run 20 miler. Amazing course. North from Foster for a 1/2 mile before turning south and running the lakefront path south to the South Shore Cultural Center, a hidden gem in our great city and a helluva long way from our starting point. Post race party in the park and buses to bring us back to Foster. A really amazing race.

I was super excited about this race and anxiously waited for the day to come. Well, in case you haven't guessed it...the run didn't go as planned. My last long run before 10.12 and I needed it to go well. Lesson be learned...if you are hosting a 1200 person event with Cindy Crawford (ei chi wa wa ) that goes to 12:30am and you have a race that starts at 6:30 am....you might not have a great run. Add huge humidity (reaching a Red warning level 2/3rd's in) and you should expect to struggle on 4 hours sleep. Regardless, I expected more of myself than I delivered. I ran 12 strong miles including passing the hardcore tailgaters preparing for the Bears game, taunting us as they stirred their bloody mary's and opened their Bud Lights in slow motion as we ran by. My breakdown happened at the aid station just past 12 miles. Training for the marathon includes learning how to fuel on the run. Rule is....walk the water stations. So, I had at miles 3, 6 and 9. At 12, I lost the mental game. After drinking 1 water and pouring 1 down my back, I chose to extend my walk to the next lightpost and then the next and the next, justifying each that if i did this now, i'd have legs to finish. It was a fatal mistake. I then justified 2 minutes of walking every mile. That grew and soon I was walking and running equal parts. It was easy to make this choice as many others, including many younger and fitter than I, made the same choice. I have trained alone to prove I can self motivate through tough miles. I learned in this race that I need to be much stronger mentally to not fall victim to excuses and self imposed "peer pressure". At the end of the day, I did it. I completed 20 miles and ran across the finish line. I learned a new degree of sore and enjoyed re-occurring and new blisters. Now, I'm tapering and in the long wait to 10/12. I can't prepare anymore except to learn from my 5 months of training and get ready mentally to run 26 miles 385 yards.

We have raised 113% if my goal, but those who know me, know that this is not enough. I am part of a larger team called Team LUNGevity and we have a goal of $35,000. We broke $30k today, but have $5k to go. As the "motivational speaker wannabe" I am, I sent a challenge to the LUNGevity team, urging them to fight for the tough dollars as they fought through the tough miles. Obviously, after issuing this challenge, we must carry our own weight. Please continue to network for donations. Together we can make the $35k goal for Team LUNGevity!

As always...thanks for reading.
P

Coming to terms..

For any of you waiting a recap of the Nike Ready Run 20 miler this weekend, forgive me. It did not go as I had hoped and as my last long run before 10/12, I'm having a bit of a struggle coming to terms with the performance. Lots of logical reasons behind the experience, but none the less. It's weighing heavy. Back on the road (well treadmill tomorrow for a short one after spin) and hopefully I'll get back to where in need to be mentally.
Please send notes, ask questions, shout out, whatever. It's going to be a long couple of weeks until the race. Need lots of love from now until then and promise that I will recap Sunday's run one of these days.
Until then...
P

For Sweetness

Today ran a charity run for Walter Payton's charity. I learned of it yesterday morning and figured "What the hell?". Feels pretty good to be able to say "What the hell?" for a 9.5 mile run the next am and think nothing of it. 9.5 is an odd distance. The run is actually 16,726 yards...Payton's total career yards which stood as the NFL record until Emmitt Smith broke it. Those who know me know that The Cowboys are my team and I'm a huge fan of Smith, but there was no one like Sweetness. He was electric to watch and magnetic off the field. He too was taken from us way too soon by this terrible disease. He had lots of good left to do and thankfully his wife Connie and family carry on his legacy. I am proud to have run in his name today.

So when I got up at 5:45 this am... torrential downpour. I debated long and hard whether to go or not. Fueled up and checked the weather. Storm was big and we were in the middle of it. Regardless, decided to go...got upstairs and boy did the bed look comfy. Listening to the rain batter the house, I decided that at this point in my Marathon training, i shouldn't risk injury or illness, so headed for bed before I stopping and convincing myself that i should go..I have to run today anyway, may as well get a t-shirt for it. Loaded up the car and after carefully negotiating streets on the verge of flooding, I turned off and headed home. Too much water, how could they have the race? Of course, as soon as I got home, the rain stopped (Teresa is convinced it was Lorraine) and i got back in my car and headed out..

The rain stoppage was only a pause..it rained on us from 1st step to last. Sometimes light, sometime a downpour. The roads were full of mini lakes, rushing temporary rivers and amazing volunteers that helped us get through it. This was my first training run in the rain (Lucky to have a perfect summer to train). First time running in squishy shoes. It was interesting at best and my already gnarly running feet were now pruned and gnarly....Thankfully, it was 70 degrees, so the rain actually felt great. It was a great course and a fun run. Will be back in 2009 for the 6th annual.

Got 2 really cool e-mails this week. The first from "the other slow guy" from my initial Blog. Jon Aguilar and I did the 10k class together that started this strange addiction. He e-mailed that he had stopped running a while back and that he was motivated by my 7/23 initial e-mail and had been running ever since. He is training for the Clarendon Hills 10k, yep, same one we ran together in 2005. It is 1 week before the Marathon and luckily I have a 6 mile run on my schedule that weekend, so I'm running it with him and even got Dave, our coach, to run it with us. Jon reminded me that we finished 3rd and 4th from last in 2005, so our goal is to finish 4th and 5th from last (or better) this year! in addition, I learned that my buddy Rob in Puerto Rico signed up for a half marathon in January. Used to be a runner and has laced the shoes back up and started training. He's never run more than a 10k. While I may or may not have had an influence on Jon, Rob or anyone else, they made the choice to strap them on and get outside, I didn't. I'm inspired by them and even more motivated than ever to keep on trucking.

Today I logged my 500th mile on my Nike Plus. That's Chicago to Odessa, MO, home of Frank Stever, the kid's Great Grandfather. Pretty cool.

I appreciate every e-mail, phone call and comment on my blog. These are keeping me going, more than you'll ever know. Keep them coming. While the experience of this training has been great, the outpouring of support and re-connection with old friends is beyond words. It's humbling. Truly.

Well on our way!

Over $4000 as of this weekend!

80% of goal achieved and 5 weeks to go!

Still the top fundraising team for LUNGevity (by over $800)!

No time to stop. Let's blow the goal out of the water.

Thanks to all who have so generously donated and given your support.
p

Within reach

I almost bailed on my 18 today...had an exhausting and stressful week and by Friday was toast, mentally and physically. I don't think I got more than 5 hours sleep any night and none of them were good nights of sleep. Regardless, I made all of my workouts. I was looking for inspiration Fri night and found it in 2 places....1) Stand up to Cancer. A Hollywood fundraiser for Cancer research. The spectacle didn't impress me, but the stories of the survivors and those who were taken from us by various forms of cancer did, especially the story of the survivor that had the same cancer that took Lorraine but was lucky enough to have the opportunity to participate in a clinical trial that worked. Why are we not being more aggressive in pursuit of this cure???? It's there, time to accelerate the process. 2) My pre-long run First marathon read was about a Nun who started running as a smoker when she was 50 and wound up setting records for her age group in the marathon and various other distances. Much to my parents dismay, I struggle with organized religion. Way to heavy for this blog, but this particular story brought light to my darkness about spirituality.....Sister Marion Irvine writes "Prior to running, I wasn't experiencing life, wasn't alive inside. Running gave me that opportunity. It changed my life in ways I never expected. I've had extraordinary experiences running the Washington Cascades, admiring God's canvas of natural beauty. I've seen bears in the river catching salmon for their lunch, beautiful mountain wildflowers that dazzle the landscape. It gives new meaning to the word spiritual. I'm not talking about organized religion here, I'm describing the spiritual process of getting in touch with one's self, i.e. our spirit, our inner self, our person. You don't have to go to Church to experience spirituality. Running can bring you to that place." Pretty cool and pretty true and might bring clarity to my struggle with my views on things........So anyway...

Woke up Saturday at 4:55 and knew there was no way. Realized that my Sat runs were always early due to the heat and that today was going to be mild. Convinced myself to get another hour sleep...so up at 6:15 and feeling horrible. nose running and lots of congestion. I fueled, including using a flat Mountain Due to get sugar and caffeine in (based on the legendary Hal Higdon's advise) and got dressed to go, having trouble breathing just standing around...I again thought that I'd be better off going back to bed and running on Sunday. For those of you who know me, this will surprise you......i actually took medicine...an antihistimine..i know, i know....as i was waiting for it to kick in, i read my 16 mile blog and was immediately ready to roll. First 2 miles were tough and then it kicked in. The run was easy, especially that back half. Miles were droping like flies. I was loving every minute of it. When I got to the fork in the road, I initially chose the known path, the one i ran last time as i knew it was flat....then, in a sudden change of plan, knowing this was my last long run on this path and wanting to see something new, turned and took the the unknown trail...I knew it was hilly...but didn't know how much. It was about 1 mile of rolling hills. some short and steep..some long and low, but to runners.....hills are hills.....someone asked afterward if Annette was yelling at me during the hills and for the first time, I can say nope, she was there, but cheering me on and proud of me....anybody but me see me growing up here??? Today's run was easy and interestingly enough, not emotional at all. During the run, I thought of the people I met Friday night during the Stand Up event, of Mark and Nelson (I added "I Still Believe" by The Call to my playlist. This was the main song we used for our production of Richard III at FSU and i enjoyed great memories of that show), my running support system, my family and Lorraine. It was a great run. Tonight, I am tired and sore and in awe of what i've done. I can't believe I'm this close. On an other note....my ipod died as it was giving me my stats...those who know me, know that I long for the praise that comes with a job well done and in running, it's Lance Armstrong on my Ipod congratulating me on a new personal best...I ended my run on Nike plus and as the woman was giving me my stats (Lance tells me good job after the stats) my Ipod died. battery dead. No Lance congratulating me....i was initially disappointed, but realized that I don't need that affirmation any longer...I know what i did and know what i will do. I don't need the "voice in my ear" any longer...I'm my own runner and I am soon to be a Marathon runner. Wow......Next stop...20 miles.....

Smooth and easy

18....done. Killer

The Human Race

Last night i was proud to participate in the largest running event in history, Nike's Human race. In 25 cities around the world, organized 10k races were run. In addition, anyone with a Nike Plus, could run and download their run to the event. 3,047,578 miles were logged as part of the race. I am not used to evening running and had a family bbq planned, but couldn't miss the event (The James was a sponsor). The course was the same as the Soldier field 10 mile, but 3.8 miles shorter. Beautiful run south on Lakeshore Drive the across to the running path along the lake back to Soldier field. The spectacle was remarkable as all runners were in the same shirts. Nike actually imprinted the bib's onto the shirts, so it was a sea of red heading south on LSD. Cool. The best part was near the turn where you saw a sea of red in front of you and a sea of red coming back at you. 14,000 runners in Chicago (the largest organized race in the states) and 491,545 runner world wide. Amazing. Race finished with Fall Out Boy concert at Soldier field. The run was hard, but I set a Personal best for a 10k. I finished 157,429 in the world. Weird to put it in that perspective, right? Check out nikeplus.com and look for the Human Race page to see all the result. Lance Armstrong ran in Austin.
Great event and just what I needed to prepare for 18 this Saturday.....It's going to be an exciting week concluding with a new personal best for distance.....need all positive energy available Sat AM. Please send it my way!